This is ridiculous!!! Whoever made such decision of killing the animal reminds me of the crudity of the us government in which it represents

Well, there is cruelty, and there is necessity. I am not sure I'd consider this cruel. I've been in fairly close proximity to bull elk before...not exactly by choice, but they didn't seem to like it either because they still feared humans. You have to understand, these animals are HUGE. They can be much larger than the one in this video, and extremely powerful. An elk that has lost its fear of humans can be of significant danger...to be frank, I am quite surprised at how benign this "attack" was...the guy could have, and should have, been shredded and trampled. (Why he kept clicking away with his camera is beyond me...I'd have been as silent as a mouse.)

If they did not put it down...what are the chances it would have ended up getting killed by a car, or had a more deadly encounter with a human being? Certainly higher than normal, and if it killed a human? Is the death of a human not more meaningful than the death of a single animal (one which is otherwise supremely protected in the US as it is)?

Finally, putting down a rogue animal like this, while certainly sad and not something you want to see, pales in comparison to the kinds of atrocities of sport shooting of lions, rhino, and other truly beautiful creatures that occurs in Africa by wealthy individuals from all over the world, or when thousands of animals are killed for no other reason than for the pure pleasure of it by 'guerrilla' troops in various African countries, the senseless killing of tigers in China, the near decimation of forest elephants again in Africa, the decimation of silverback guerrilla jungle habitat (again, in AFRICA), etc. If you want to get on a cause for preserving animals, just check out Africa. There are true, senseless atrocities against wild animals there that are decimating animal populations, and that nothing done in the united states for decades comes close to.

This is ridiculous!!! Whoever made such decision of killing the animal reminds me of the crudity of the us government in which it represents

Well, there is cruelty, and there is necessity. I am not sure I'd consider this cruel. I've been in fairly close proximity to bull elk before...not exactly by choice, but they didn't seem to like it either because they still feared humans. You have to understand, these animals are HUGE. They can be much larger than the one in this video, and extremely powerful. An elk that has lost its fear of humans can be of significant danger...to be frank, I am quite surprised at how benign this "attack" was...the guy could have, and should have, been shredded and trampled. (Why he kept clicking away with his camera is beyond me...I'd have been as silent as a mouse.)

If they did not put it down...what are the chances it would have ended up getting killed by a car, or had a more deadly encounter with a human being? Certainly higher than normal, and if it killed a human? Is the death of a human not more meaningful than the death of a single animal (one which is otherwise supremely protected in the US as it is)?

Finally, putting down a rogue animal like this, while certainly sad and not something you want to see, pales in comparison to the kinds of atrocities of sport shooting of lions, rhino, and other truly beautiful creatures that occurs in Africa by wealthy individuals from all over the world, or when thousands of animals are killed for no other reason than for the pure pleasure of it by 'guerrilla' troops in various African countries, the senseless killing of tigers in China, the near decimation of forest elephants again in Africa, the decimation of silverback guerrilla jungle habitat (again, in AFRICA), etc. If you want to get on a cause for preserving animals, just check out Africa. There are true, senseless atrocities against wild animals there that are decimating animal populations, and that nothing done in the united states for decades comes close to.